In an effort to draw attention to its new Lumia branded Windows Phone 7 phones, Nokia has joined AT&amp;T in preparing for a high profile launch, apparently starting with new spots that attempt to resurrect 2010's Antennagate.

An unbranded "Smartphone Beta Test" website, counting down to the launch of Nokia's AT&amp;T debut, fictitiously documents a series of supposed design flaws alluding to the fragility of the iPhone's touch screen and the "death grip" associated with iPhone 4 and its Antennagate issue launched by Gizmodo nearly two years ago.

Other spots, each modeled to look like security camera footage of internal design meetings, highlight flaws with Android phones using OLED screens that only work well inside, creating an overall impression that the smartphone category has been in beta for years, waiting for Microsoft and Nokia to finally release a "non-beta" phone.

Nokia has already launched its Lumia 710 in the US via T-Mobile, but after rapidly falling out of even that carrier's top three phones at the hands of Android competitors, the once leading vendor of smartphones is now hoping to relaunch Lumia in the US with AT&amp;T, a much larger partner.

Without being able to draw attention to the popularity of Windows Phone 7 or a diverse, rich selection of apps for the platform, Nokia appears to be aiming at drawing attention to the real or imagined flaws of its competitors.

Death Grip

Ironically, Nokia's "Death Grip" spot appears to be trying to associate poor antenna performance from "holding it wrong" with iPhone 4, as a tester in the video complains, "shouldn't I be able to hold it however I want?"

Back in 2010, Nokia attempted to make hay from Antennagate by blogging, "providing a wide range of methods and grips for people to hold their phones, without interfering with the antennae, has been an essential feature of every device Nokia has built," and insisting, "you’re free to hold your Nokia device any way you like. And you won’t suffer any signal loss. Cool, huh?"

At the same time, Nokia had long instructed its users to "avoid touching the antenna area unnecessarily while the antenna is transmitting or receiving," and noted in its product manuals that "contact with antennas affects the communication quality and may cause the device to operate at a higher power level than otherwise needed and my reduce the battery life."

Following Nokia's potshots at the iPhone 4's antenna, the company's users posted a variety of videos to YouTube highlighting the same hand-blocking of signal on Nokia's E71, 6230 and 6720 models.

Nokia's similar addressing of OLED screens as a "beta" design mistake are also brow raising, given that the company was among the first to promote OLED screens for use on smartphones, starting with a rebranded Pantech feature phone it attempted to sell in the US back in 2006 as the 6215i; the high end N85 and N86 models it released beginning in 2008 to compete against Apple's iPhone and the newer N8 that was supposed to make Nokia's Symbian a credible contender to iPhone 4.

AT&amp;T has stated its Lumia launch with Nokia will be a "notch above anything we've ever done," powered by another $100 million of advertising pooled by Microsoft among WP7 partners, of whom AT&amp;T has been signed up to give the new Lumia model "hero" status as a heavily promoted device in its retail stores.

Microsoft reportedly allocated $500 million to push WP7 at its launch in late 2010. Its executives also indicated that the company, carriers and manufacturing partners would collectively spend "billions" of dollars marketing WP7 devices during its first year. Those efforts failed to materialize in the form of significant WP7 phone sales however.

According to end of year figures by the NPD Group, Windows Phone's smartphone market share has not topped 2 percent since it launched. Meanwhile, sales of Android and iOS handsets reached a combined 82 percent of the market in the first three quarters of 2011 the firm stated. Nielsen estimated Windows Phone's share of the market for the third quarter of 2011 alone as just 1.2 percent.

Nokia has tied its smartphone strategy to Microsoft's WP7 platform after ditching its own failed experiment with open sourcing the Symbian platform it cultivated over the past decade, and a brief patterning with Intel to create MeeGo as a separate, open platform for smartphones and mobile devices.

Lame , lame lame.
I still have the first iPhone 4 and I have never, ever had a dropped call from the so called death grip. And why now. Why bring up this old issue nearly two damn years later?
Pathetic. Pathetic nokia.

1) There are two more of these teaser ads on Nokia's website. I'd say that two are attacking the iPhone, not just the deathgrip ad.

2) I'm not sure if they are effective as I hear they are confusing if you don't already know the inside story before watching them, but they are funny.

3) Does the use of SNL's Chris Parnell on their website point to a significant US focus?

Quote:

Originally Posted by maccherry

Lame , lame lame.
I still have the first iPhone 4 and I have never, ever had a dropped call from the so called death grip. And why now. Why bring up this old issue nearly two damn years later?
Pathetic. Pathetic nokia.

1) Campaigns aren't about the truth, it's about using fear and ignorance to sway you. Emotion is a powerful thing and has nothing to with rational thought.

2) I'm still on my iPhone 4 (returned iPhone 4S because of battery issues). I also haven't been using a Bumper for about a year as I went through several rather quickly.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.

Resurrecting a 2-year old iPhone controversy that few people remember as part of the ad campaign for your new phone? Did Nokia actually PAY someone to come up with this? This is the dumbest marketing idea I've heard in a long long time.

Marketing 101 - Never bring up your competitors, it only takes the spotlight off of your product, and could back fire depending on the consumer. Especially when the competitive issue is two years old and has since been resolved. Nokia has not only ignored those principles, but actually paying someone to do it. I will enjoy seeing them crash and burn.

Marketing 101 - Never bring up your competitors, it only takes the spotlight off of your product, and could back fire depending on the consumer. Especially when the competitive issue is two years old and has since been resolved. Nokia has not only ignored those principles, but actually paying someone to do it. I will enjoy seeing them crash and burn.

That's a great rule but it's not always accurate. For instance, Apple's Get a Mac ads made a point of just saying "PC" never saying Windows even though when they bashed the OS it was clear what they meant. It was only when Windows Vista was deemed a market failure that they decided to do a more open comparison. That is an acceptable usage but you can't do it against the prevailing champion.

Much like Apple's Get A Mac ads Nokia didn't mention any companies or brands in these ads. Now there is a distinct difference in that these teaser ads also aren't mentioning Nokia, Lumia, MS or Windows Phone. They are also attacking, in at least one ad, a single issue despite the iPhone 4 being exceptionally popular and well loved, whereas with Vista the issues were too general and numerous that the whole brand was tarnished.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.

Marketing 101 - Never bring up your competitors, it only takes the spotlight off of your product, and could back fire depending on the consumer. Especially when the competitive issue is two years old and has since been resolved. Nokia has not only ignored those principles, but actually paying someone to do it. I will enjoy seeing them crash and burn.

There is no denying that smartphone antennae in general are not as good as those on past feature phones (haven't had a feature phone in some time and so don't know what they are like). There is no denying that past BBs had better reception, in general, than many (most?) current smartphones.

But what's also true is that smartphones are computers first and phones second (third?). We accept the shortcomings that accompany the greater utility.

What is it with this -gate stuff? The Watergate burglary happened almost 40 years ago, and even then, -gate was only the third syllable of the name of the condominium where the burglary happened. Many peoplegate reading this columngate were not even alivegate back then. Isn't it timegate to end the neologismgate with the gategate? Or must everything be written in this dialect of pig Latin?

Now we have heatgate, antennagate, tyopgate, misspellinggate, paperjamgate, and so on ad nauseam. Can't creative writers think of something creative? Or is this a creativitygate, too?

To put it in blogger language: We have had a plethora of multiple disparate gategates, and it is time to shutter the practice.

After seeing this Adds, who is ever going to buy these phones. The Adds maybe funny for everyone that loves his/her iPhone and/or has followed all the "antennagate", but anybody without this background will be repulsed by this awfully ugly vid.

You are forgeting that not everyone is into tech like you and me. Most people actually have lives and when they see the ads will subconsciously start being the effect it. It is a perfect example of FUD in operation. Apple and all companies do the same thing. It is all a part of fooling (I mean marketing) the public.

So the next time said consumer is comparison shopping the doubt will be there (even if it is not true) Business is all about perception and that's advertisings job, to influence perception.

Originally by Rickers - 2014 : Cook & will bury Apple. They can only ride Steve's ghost so long.

History reduce Apple Watch.... to a footnote in the annals of technology - Benjamin Frost Dec 2014

Marketing 101 - Never bring up your competitors, it only takes the spotlight off of your product, and could back fire depending on the consumer. Especially when the competitive issue is two years old and has since been resolved. Nokia has not only ignored those principles, but actually paying someone to do it. I will enjoy seeing them crash and burn.

You are forgeting that not everyone is into tech like you and me. Most people actually have lives and when they see the ads will subconsciously start being the effect it. It is a perfect example of FUD in operation. Apple and all companies do the same thing. It is all a part of fooling (I mean marketing) the public.

So the next time said consumer is comparison shopping the doubt will be there (even if it is not true) Business is all about perception and that's advertisings job, to influence perception.

Notice they also get in a aura of the economic downturn/unemployment: "But I want to know how to hold it." "Fire him" (throwing something at his head).

Message: Use an iPhone, get fired.

Seems like a bad plot device in a movie. Which ad agency came up with this????

It's unfortunate that people don't understand that every phone looses some signal when you wrap your hand around it. It's even more unfortunate that people believe that the number of bars displayed is an accurate current measurement and display of phone reception. My 12 year old LG flip-phone with external antenna even looses bars when I hand-hold it. You can't defeat the laws of physics, but you can alter perception.

Bars provide a general signal reading, but they are buffered so that you get a steady reading over time. A drop in signal strength may take a minute or two to register with fewer bars. An increase in strength may take only 5 to 10 seconds to display more bars.

Advertising is nothing more than a game of deception. Algotithms are created to make you think your hand doesn't make a difference. It does, on every make of phone.

Besides hand blocking, signal strength varies because of cell-tower activity. you may be in one spot, but as other phones connect to them, your signal may be passed from one antenna to another antenna on the same tower, or even from one tower to another tower. Advertising isn't about communicating reality. It's all about what you think is reality.

I'm so glad I ditched my iPhone 4 for a 4S- big difference all over. Antennagate or not.

There's numerous little signs that Microsoft's frenemy stance with Apple might be getting a little strained. Microsoft/Nokia, thru their proxy Mosaid, sued Apple again last month over another set of standards-essential patents that came from Nokia. Florian Mueller's tone towards Apple the past few months has been a bit more harsh when it involves issues that could also affect Microsoft, and as others have mentioned the new ad campaign smells like a MS effort to mock Apple.

I wouldn't be totally shocked to see the gloves come off if their Metro effort doesn't make an impact in the market.

I thought that the new Nokia handsets for wp7 were pretty good and if I was looking for an alternative to ios it would be my first point of call.

These adverts seem unnecessary as the new nokia handsets looks like a decent product. Maybe they are not confident in it and just need to create click bait vids?

I played with one and I wasn't impressed. It does work well (it's larger than I would like, but not obnoxiously so), and Windows Phone 7 is an improvement over Symbian, but it's not enough to make me switch.

Unless of course you want to claim Anandtech faked the tests, which isn't totally out of the question. . . maybe 99.9% out of the question.

And when you get to the part about actual use, the rest of the story comes out:
"From my day of testing, I've determined that the iPhone 4 performs much better than the 3GS in situations where signal is very low, at -113 dBm (1 bar). Previously, dropping this low all but guaranteed that calls would drop, fail to be placed, and data would no longer be transacted at all. I can honestly say that I've never held onto so many calls and data simultaneously on 1 bar at -113 dBm as I have with the iPhone 4, so it's readily apparent that the new baseband hardware is much more sensitive compared to what was in the 3GS. The difference is that reception is massively better on the iPhone 4 in actual use."

"I'm way over my head when it comes to technical issues like this"Gatorguy 5/31/13

When you've got a great product, it sells itself. When you don't, say and do anything.

I don't know why they would invite comparison. It reminds me of Microsoft's mock funeral procession for iPhone and Android, back when they launched Windows Phone 7 with a whimper. It didn't just fail to suck the air out of the room, it failed to move a single molecule of air.

Unless of course you want to claim Anandtech faked the tests, which isn't totally out of the question. . . maybe 99.9% out of the question.

The Antenna is Improved
From my day of testing, I've determined that the iPhone 4 performs much better than the 3GS in situations where signal is very low, at -113 dBm (1 bar). Previously, dropping this low all but guaranteed that calls would drop, fail to be placed, and data would no longer be transacted at all. I can honestly say that I've never held onto so many calls and data simultaneously on 1 bar at -113 dBm as I have with the iPhone 4, so it's readily apparent that the new baseband hardware is much more sensitive compared to what was in the 3GS. The difference is that reception is massively better on the iPhone 4 in actual use.
What this boils down to is Apple should have adjusted the signal bars to represent a lower dB before the iPhone 4 release because their clearly superior design of the iPhone 4 antennas allowed for connections that were not previously common with cellphones. They failed to account for this change and so people saw a drop in bars and thought this represented a lack of connectivity when the number of bars and the dB level are not static indications of the ability to make and receive calls and data across all phones.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.